Thomas Walsingham

“ Our Lady of Walsingham, the best-loved church in England; and the ever-famous shrine of St. Thomas à Becket at Canterbury. "Optimus aegrorum medicus fit Thomas Bonorum," was the motto engraved on the little pewter flasks brought back by Canterbury pilgrims. "For good people who are ill, Thomas is the best of physicians." ”

“ The actor is more likely to have been Sir Thomas's son. The father took no degree at Cambridge. On leaving the university he became amanuensis to Sir Francis Walsingham, and his dexterity and despatch gained for him in that capacity the nickname of ‘Swiftsure,’ after a well-known ship. He displayed some interest in antiquities, and joined the Elizabethan Society of Antiquaries, founded by Archbishop Parker. A paper on sterling money, read to the members by Lake, appears in Hearne's ‘Curious Discourses,’ i. ”

“ No. 214, where Wilson is erroneously styled ‘Sir Thomas’) . Another, an old copy of an anonymous painting, was in 1879 transferred from the British Museum to the National Portrait Gallery, London. A copy of his will, dated 19 May 1581, is preserved at Hatfield (Cal. Hatfield MSS. ii. 391) . He left his house at Edmonton to the overseers of his will, Sir Francis Walsingham, Sir William Winter, and Matthew Smith, to be sold to pay his debts; five hundred marks to his daughter Mary on her marriage or coming of age, and a like sum to his daughter Lucrece; his son Nicholas was to be sole executor. ”

“ Great confidence was reposed in him by Henry VII., who chose him as godfather of the future Henry VIII. To Fox is attributed the introduction of Wolsey to the king. Yet this appears to have failed to win him the cardinal's gratitude, for, according to Fuller: "All thought Bishop Fox to die too soon, only one excepted who conceived him to live too long, Thomas Wolsey, who gaped for his bishopric." With Hugh Oldham, bishop of Exeter, Fox was joint-founder of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, the pelican in her piety, which appears on the college arms, being borne by the bishop. ”

“ On Whitsunday 1162 Henry de Blois consecrated Thomas à Becket as archbishop, and it is said that when King Henry visited him just before his death he was reproved by the bishop for his murder of Becket. Henry de Blois was certainly a militant churchman; but in an age not conspicuous for such virtues, we are told, his private life was pure, and he laboured steadfastly for the good of his diocese. The Winchester annalist says of him, "Never was man more chaste and prudent, more compassionate, or more earnest in transacting ecclesiastical matters, or in beautifying churches." ”

“ Thomas Langton (1493-1500) , translated hither from Salisbury, where he was active against the adherents of Wiclif, was chosen in 1500 to occupy the see of Canterbury, but he died of the plague before his translation, and was buried in his chantry to the south of the Lady Chapel. He seems to have been enthusiastic in the cause of education, since he is said to have himself superintended the teaching of boys in his town.
Richard Fox (1500-1528) was bishop successively of Exeter, Bath and Wells, and Durham before he was appointed to Winchester. ”

“ He is getting old. All the world was growing old, and all his contemporaries, in the phrase of the day, were “a little thing sickish.” The intrepid and laborious Walsingham is described as being “troubled with his old diseases: the tympany and carnosity,” and so is absent from Court. Letters still flowed in to the Earl, news of the Netherlands campaign, from the now depressed Lord Leicester, the Governor, news of the Queen’s movements, of Spain, of the legal strife of his contemporaries and friends. ”

“ In truth, Elizabeth and James were personally the great support of the high church interest; it had few real friends among their counsellors.
[368] Burnet, ii. 418; Cabala, part ii. 38 (4to edition) . Walsingham grounds the queen's proceedings upon two principles: the one, that "consciences are not to be forced, but to be won and reduced by force of truth, with the aid of time, and use of all good means of instruction and persuasion;" the other, that "cases of conscience, when they exceed their bounds, and grow to be matter of faction, lose their nature ”

“ Such an experience made Walsingham reluctant to undertake other diplomatic missions. The queen's indecision had allowed the king of Scotland to fall under the influence of the catholic party among his councillors; but when Elizabeth realised the danger in which a breach with Scotland would involve her, she bade Walsingham go to Edinburgh and judge at close quarters the position of affairs. James was to be dissuaded at all hazards from negotiating with Spain in behalf of his mother. Walsingham did not complacently face a repetition of the humiliation that he had suffered in France. ”

“ With all this machinery in his hands, Walsingham patiently awaited the progress of the correspondence, till it should have ripened into sufficient flagrancy to become fatal to his dupes. That it might speed the faster, he seems to have applied a strong stimulus through his agent Pooley. About Midsummer he had obtained a letter from Babington to Mary, proposing in plain terms the murder of Elizabeth, and the liberation of herself, on receiving her unequivocal sanction to those two measures. ”

“ A pious Norfolk lady caused a little wooden house to be built in imitation of the Holy House at Nazareth and invited her neighbours to join with her there in meditation on the mystery of the Immaculate Conception. With time and a great concourse of pilgrims came an elaboration of legend and a variety of foreign accessories, maybe exaggerated in the half satirical description given by Erasmus. But when the true unvarnished story of Walsingham comes to be written it will show that to the very end a degree of sober good sense controlled the authorities there. ”

“ Walsingham, in his history of the reign, describes with unction the King’s childish behaviour during his fits of ungovernable anger,31 his violent words on more than one occasion to his Parliaments, and his absurd extravagance in dress. With righteous indignation he relates how Richard, on his way to London, borrowed from the monastery a palfrey, which he never returned. ”

“ If the good man had any cause of dissatisfaction, it was with the Calvinistic tendencies of the Ambassador’s household. Walsingham was always on the Puritanical side of Elizabeth’s court, and such an atmosphere as that of Paris, where the Roman Catholic system was at that time showing more corruption than it has ever done before or since in any other place, naturally threw him into sympathy with the Reformed. ”

“ On the plains all waited for letters. Walsingham was no exception to the rule. Few came. He was too far away. Younger sons of impoverished noblemen are sent to far-off places purposely to be forgotten. He employed the intervals between such stray notes as he received in studying Cyclona. ”

“ He was much employed in political affairs by Sir Francis Walsingham, after whose death he retired into private life. He died on 29 March 1608, and was buried in the chancel of the church at Chertsey, Surrey, where a black marble was erected to his memory with a curious Latin inscription which is printed by Wood. ”

“ His tongue for prating like a moon-struck boy's.
"I am mad," he cried, "I am mad to babble so!"
Then Walsingham drew near him with strange eyes
And muttered slowly, "Write that madness down;
Ay, write it down, that madman's plan of thine;
Sign it, and let me take it to the Queen."
But the weather-wiser seaman warily
Answered him, "If it please Almighty God
To take away our Queen Elizabeth,
Seeing that she is mortal as ourselves,
England might then be leagued with Spain, and I
Should here have sealed my doom. I will not put
My pen to paper." ”

“ It’s indeed inveterately against himself that he makes his imagination act. What a pity he has such a lot of it! He’s too beastly intelligent. Besides, the famous reading’s still to come off, and it has been postponed a day to allow Guy Walsingham to arrive. It appears this eminent lady’s staying at a house a few miles off, which means of course that Mrs. Wimbush has forcibly annexed her. She’s to come over in a day or two—Mrs. Wimbush wants her to hear Mr. Paraday.
“To-day’s wet and cold, and several of the company, at the invitation of the Duke, have driven over to luncheon at Bigwood. ”

“ Weary suppliants, on the way to, or returning from, the road of Our Lady of Walsingham, far away on the road through and past Norwich, housed here, and misbehaved themselves in their mediæval way. It would, as already hinted, be the gravest [Pg 91] mistake to assume pilgrims to have been, quâ pilgrims, necessarily decorous; and, indeed, modern Bank Holiday folks, compared with them, would shine as true examples of monkish austerity.
HOUSE FORMERLY A PILGRIMS’ HOSTEL, COMPTON.
The shrine at Walsingham, very highly esteemed in East Anglia, drew crowds from every class, from king to beggar. ”

“ By way of avenging himself on him for his interposition, Arran substituted ‘a stone of crystal’ for the rich diamond in the ring which James assigned to the English envoy on his departure (State Papers, Scotl., ed. Thorpe, i. 452–9; Cal. Hatfield MSS. iii. 124–7; Melvill, Memoirs, 1683, pp. 147–8; Hume, The Great Lord Burghley, pp. 381–2) .
Walsingham's purpose was unchanged. The queen must still be driven at all costs into effective intervention in behalf of the protestants in the Low Countries. The chances of the queen's surrender on the point seemed small. ”

“ Of thy immortal Wit will never die.
He wrote also besides his Arcadia, several other Works; namely, A Defence of Poesie, a Book entituled Astrophel and Stella, with divers Songs and Sonnets in praise of his Lady, whom he celebrated under that bright Name; whom afterwards he married, that Paragon of Nature, Sir Francis Walsingham's Daughter, who impoverished himself to enrich the State; from whom he expected no more than what was above all Portions, a beautiful Wife, and a virtuous Daughter. ”

“ Thou knowest well all evidence that can be obtained anent every one implicated with that ‘bosom serpent, Mary,’ should be gotten wil or nil.”
“My Lord of Burleigh is seeking you,” said Lord Shrope. “He reporteth that Babington hath made full confession, and hath thrown himself upon the mercy of the queen.”
“Say you so?” Walsingham started for the door, and then paused. “Thy services will not be needed to-day,” he said to the tormentor. “As for thee,” turning to Francis, “thy sex protects thee from torture, but in 258 sooth I wonder that one so young should be so staunch.” ”

“ For three hours the struggle and carnage went on, every one fighting. Soot against Scot, Englishman against Englishman, with the fury of demons; the archers all the while pouring in their showers of arrows on their opponents, so that, as Walsingham says, "the dead lay thick as leaves in autumn;" and so encumbered were the ranks, that there was scarcely any advancing over them. Still, everywhere the forces of Percy and Douglas were carrying the day; yet, at length, Henry's fortune once more prevailed. He had fought everywhere with a gallantry not surpassed by any man in the field. ”

“ But the popular feeling ran so strongly against him that it was felt impossible for him to remain at Waterford, and having obtained letters of recommendation to Walsingham from Lord Grey and Archbishop Loftus, he repaired to England, apparently in September 1581. ”

“ If other men be chosen, it shall avail you nothing; rather it shall be found to your sore cost. For those that have paid rent to Walsingham I shall take good measure—you among the rest, mine host.”
“Good knight,” said the host, “I will swear upon the cross of Holywood I did but pay to Walsingham upon compulsion. Nay, bully knight, I love not the rogue Walsinghams; they were as poor as thieves, bully knight. Give me a great lord like you. Nay; ask me among the neighbours, I am stout for Brackley.”
“It may be,” said Sir Daniel, dryly. “Ye shall then pay twice.” ”

“ I don't know whether it was Doctor Walsingham's visit in the morning, and the chance of hearing something about it, that prompted the unquiet Tom Toole to roll his cloak about him, and buffet his way through storm and snow, to Devereux's lodgings. ”

“ In her answer to this letter, she does not advert to this hint, but mentions Babington as in correspondence with her. At her trial she denied all communication with him.
[251] It may probably be answered to this, that if the letter signed by Walsingham as well as Davison to Sir Amias Paulet, urging him "to find out some way to shorten the life of the Scots queen," be genuine, which cannot perhaps be justly questioned (though it is so in the Biog. Brit. art. Walsingham, note O) , it will be difficult to give him credit for any scrupulousness with respect to Mary. ”

“ Walsingham, in a letter to the Lord Chancellor at the time, said, "I am sorry the Lord Admiral was forced to leave the prosecution of the enemy through the want he sustains. Our half doings doth breed dishonour, and leaveth the disease uncured." But the winds and waves did for the English what they themselves had left undone. A terrible tempest assailed the flying Armada to the north of Scotland, and scattered its unhappy ships amongst the iron-bound islands of the Orkneys and Hebrides. ”

“ Secretary Walsingham has given you. You told me a while ago that Ballard was on the eve of going to France. Now Walsingham is no fool. I would to God he were! He has laid enough of our men by the heels already."
"By God!" cried Anthony, roused again. "I would not willingly call you a fool either, my man! But do you not understand that Walsingham believes me as loyal as himself? Here have I been at court for the last year, bowing before her Grace, and never a word said to me on my religion. And here is Walsingham has bidden me to lodge in his house, in the midst of all his spider's webs. ”